What Causes High Cholesterol?

Someting to remember even if you eat healthy.  Cholesterol is also made in several different organs in our bodies. If even one of these five main areas of cholesterol production are out of wack, as through illness, then you may have another cause of high cholesterol in you.

The body itself, as through genetics, can cause high cholesterol, as the body makes cholesterol of it's own accord.

Certain fats in our diet - the saturated fats, normally found in meat - can increase the cholesterol production in our body.

There are many causes of high cholesterol, and dietary cholesterol and dietary saturated fats are leading causes of high cholesterol.

The genetic causes of high cholesterol can be mitigated against to some extent by following a low cholesterol diet, however, even with a cholesterol lowering diet, the genes causing high cholesterol can still produce too much cholesterol, and so continue to cause high cholesterol.

Australia New Zealand Food Standards

Food Standards Australia New Zealand’s (FSANZ) dietary modelling has found that Australians obtain on average 0.5 per cent of their daily kilojoules from TFAs and New Zealanders on average 0.6 per cent. This is well below the WHO recommendation. It is also below the levels in many other countries. 

It is not mandatory to declare TFAs on the label, although manufacturers can provide this information voluntarily. However, TFAs must be declared on a food label if the manufacturer makes a nutrition claim about cholesterol or saturated, trans, polyunsaturated, monounsaturated, omega-3, omega-6 or omega-9 fatty acids. Read more...

In 2005, CHOICE (Australia) tested more than 50 processed foods and found many contained trans fats at unacceptably high levels and while some fast-food chains have reduced their levels of trans fats, and some of the foods tested previously have eliminated trans fats altogether, others now apparently contain even more than before. Read more...

Some brands of margarine, for example, state the serving size as 1 tsp. This is very little margarine, barely enough to spread on one slice of bread. If you eat two or more slices of bread spread with margarine, chances are that you will be taking 4 or 5 or more servings of margarine.

Trans Fats & Trans Fatty Acid

Health experts will fight for the mandatory labeling of food products containing the artery-clogging fats (trans fats) at the Review of Food Labeling and Policy appointed by the Australia and New Zealand Food Regulation Ministerial Council and by the Council of Australian Governments. Read more...

Under the current rules of Australia, processed foods containing trans fats are seldom identified. As many as 6000 Australians die every year from diseases which are linked to eating too much trans fats.

Countries such as Switzerland and Denmark have banned trans fats and US has mandatory food labeling.

Trans fats are made by heating liquid vegetable oils in the presence of the gas hydrogen, a process called, unsurprisingly, hydrogenation. The hydrogenation increases the shelf life and flavor of the food so the food industry use it.

It is now mandatory to put the amount of trans fats on the food label in many countries like USA and Australia. Other countries like India has no regulation on trans fats so it is being used freely in many food products. The trans fatty acids are so dangerous to the health that the governments should actually ban the use of trans fats in foods. Read more...

Trans fats are found naturally in dairy products, lamb, beef and mutton. They are also found in many packed foods which use hydrogenated vegetable fats. You can find it in many snacks, viz. cookies, cakes, fried foods, microwave popcorn, margarine, etc. Always look for the words shortening, partially hydrogenated vegetable oil or hydrogenated vegetable oil on the food label, these are nothing but trans fats.

Trans fats are worse for cholesterol levels than saturated fats because they not only raise LDL (lethal) cholesterol but also lower HDL (healthy) cholesterol - a real double whammy. Saturated Fats - Just Plain Bad. Learn more...

Nutrition Fact Labels: True or False

Nutrition facts labels in the US have, since 1 January 2006, been required by the US Food and Drug Adminisration to state the content of trans fats.

Under FDA regulations, "if the serving contains less than 0.5 gram (of trans fat), the content, when declared, shall be expressed as zero."

Canadian legislation is more stringent on this, and allows the trans fat content to be stated as zero only when it is less than 0.2 grams per serving.

Thus, when foods contain as much as 0.4 grams trans fat – in fact, as much as 0.499 grams of trans fats – they shall / must be shown in US nutrition facts labels as having zero trans fats. If you eat, say, five servings of such foods a day, you may end up consuming more than 2 grams of trans fats. Even though 2 grams may not sound like a lot, it is enough to significantly increase your risks of heart disease, obesity, diabetes and other degenerative diseases.

So apart from nutrition facts labels, it is also important to check the ingredients lists. If the lists include words like "shortening" or "partially hydrogenated" it means that the products contain trans fats. Read more...

Currently, Australia's food labeling laws do not require trans fats to be shown separately from the total fat content. However, margarine in Australia has been free of trans fat since 1996. Australia has chosen to define trans fats strictly as any fat containing a trans bond. Read more...

Denmark became the first country to introduce laws strictly regulating the sale of many foods containing trans fats in March 2003, a move which effectively bans partially hydrogenated oils.

Switzerland followed Denmark's trans fats ban, and implemented its own beginning in April 2008.

On request the European Food Safety Authority produced a scientific opinion on trans fatty acids.

Sainsbury's became the first UK major retailer to ban all trans fat from all their own brand foods. On 13 December 2007, the Food Standards Agency (UK) issued news releases stating that voluntary measures to reduce trans fats in food had already resulted in safe levels of consumer intake.

There are four kinds of fats: monounsaturated fat, polyunsaturated fat, saturated fat, and trans fat. Monounsaturated fat and polyunsaturated fat are the "good" fats. It is generally accepted that consumption of saturated fat should be kept low, especially for adults. Trans fat (which means trans fatty acids) is the worst kind of fat, far worse than saturated fat. Read more...

WHO recommendations

The World Health Organisation or WHO recommendation is that intake of trans fat should not exceed 1 percent of the total colories, and that saturated fats should not exceed 10 percent of total calories.

The WHO recommendation is not a number based on any scientific studies because, as far as modern scientific research has shown, the safe level of trans fat is ZERO.

Assuming an average person consumes 2,000 calories per day, 1 percent translates to 20 calories, which will come from about 2 grams of trans fats. This might not seem much. But a serving of McDonalds french fries and fried chicked nuggets in the US contains about 10 grams of trans fats. (The figure varies. In Denmark, which banned trans fats in 2003, the same meal contains only about 0.3 grams of trans fats.)

Very small amounts are enough to significantly increase a person's risk of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and other health problems.

Research has shown that saturated fats – even though they are thought to cause heart disease – are necessary and beneficial for health. And so, in order to keep healthy, we should ensure that about 10 percent of our calorie intake consists of saturated fats. Read more...

Benefits of Saturated Fats

The many health benefits of saturated fats have largely been ignored in recent decades, as scientists, health experts and health autohorities focus mainly on their supposed dangers. In the process, many people forget that saturated fats are actually necessary for health highly beneficial in many ways.

The people of Okinawa, an island in Southern Japan, are well known for their longevity and excellent health – to the extent that books have been written about the Okinawa diet. The main cooking oil used by the people of Okinawa is pork lard.

Well known for their love of good food, the French also have low rates of heart disease and other degenerative diseases compared with, say, the Americans. The French diet contains lots of saturated fats in the form of butter, cheese, cream. eggs, meats and liver, including pates.

In general, people of the Mediterranean countries consume quite large amounts of saturated fats – and enjoy good health.

Saturated fats are commonly regarded as harmful for the heart, yet the heart is probably the one organ that benefits most from saturated fats. Read more...